The Mystic of the Sonian Forest

In the quiet solitude of the Sonian Forest near Brussels, a 14th-century mystic named Jan van Ruusbroec (1293–1381) mapped the landscape of the human soul with a precision that rivals modern psychoanalysis. Known as the “Admirable Doctor,” Ruusbroec was not an academic theologian but a contemplative who wrote in the vernacular Middle Dutch, making the deepest truths of the spirit accessible to the common person.

Ruusbroec’s work is a vital bridge between medieval mysticism and modern depth psychology. He conceptualized God not as a static being, but as a “flowing, ebbing tide”—a dynamic process that mirrors the Jungian understanding of the Self. His description of the “Common Life” (Gemeyne Leven) challenges the modern tendency to split spirituality from daily existence, offering a path to integration that is as relevant today as it was 700 years ago.

Biography & Timeline: Jan van Ruusbroec (1293–1381)

Born in the village of Ruisbroek, Jan entered the priesthood at age 24. Disillusioned by the corruption and superficiality of city life in Brussels, he retreated to a hermitage in Groenendaal (Green Valley) at the age of 50. There, he founded a community based on the Augustinian rule, but focused intensely on the inner life.

Ruusbroec was a fierce critic of the “Free Spirit” heresy (a distortion of mysticism that claimed one could become perfect and thus above morality). Instead, he taught that true union with God leads to *more* service to the world, not less. His writings influenced the *Devotio Moderna*, the movement that produced Thomas à Kempis and the Imitation of Christ.

Key Milestones in the Life of Ruusbroec

Major Concepts: The Sparkling Stone and the Abyss

The Three Stages of Life

Ruusbroec structured the spiritual journey into three phases, which parallel the Jungian process of individuation:

1. The Active Life: The development of the ego, moral virtue, and external service. (Jung’s First Half of Life).
2. The Interior Life: The turning inward, facing the darkness, and cultivating “yearning” for God. (The Confrontation with the Shadow).
3. The Contemplative Life: The “God-seeing” life where the distinction between subject and object dissolves in the “Abyss.” (The realization of the Self).

The Abyss (Afgront)

Ruusbroec describes God as an “Abyss” or “Wild Sea.” This is not a comforting image, but a terrifying and awe-inspiring one. Psychologically, this is the Collective Unconscious—the source of all psychic energy that is far greater than the individual ego. To enter the Abyss is to lose the rigid boundaries of the self.

The Conceptualization of Trauma: Fragmentation vs. The Common Life

Ruusbroec offers a profound antidote to the fragmentation caused by trauma: the concept of the Common Life.

Trauma as “Resting in Oneself”

Ruusbroec criticized false mystics who sought a “natural rest” or a dissociative state where they felt nothing. He called this “spiritual gluttony.” In clinical terms, this is spiritual bypassing or dissociation. The traumatized person often seeks to “check out” to avoid pain.

Healing through “Living Without Why”

True healing, for Ruusbroec, is not escaping pain, but entering a state of “living without why” (sonder waerom). This means acting not out of a desperate need for validation (ego-defenses) but out of the flow of the Self.

In therapy, this looks like moving from a rigid, trauma-based identity (“I must be perfect to be safe”) to a fluid, integrated identity (“I am inherently worthy”).

The “Sparkling Stone” of Resilience

In his work The Sparkling Stone, Ruusbroec uses the metaphor of a white stone given to the initiate. This stone represents the indestructible core of the personality. Trauma may shatter the ego, but it cannot touch the “Sparkling Stone” of the Self. Reconnecting the patient to this inner resilience is the primary goal of depth work.

Legacy: The Integration of Action and Contemplation

Ruusbroec’s greatest legacy is his insistence that the highest state of consciousness is not withdrawing from the world, but returning to it with new eyes. He taught that the true mystic “exhales” love into the world just as they “inhale” the spirit of God.

For the modern patient, this is a message of hope. It suggests that the goal of therapy is not just to feel better in the consulting room, but to engage with life, relationships, and work from a place of deep, “common” wholeness. The mystic and the merchant, the therapist and the patient, are all called to the same essential integration.

Further Reading & Resources

• Paulist Press: John Ruusbroec: The Spiritual Espousals and Other Works.
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Medieval Mysticism and Phenomenology.
• Christian Classics Ethereal Library: The Adornment of the Spiritual Marriage.

Explore More on Mysticism & Psychology

• Meister Eckhart: The Unconscious and the Godhead
• Johannes Tauler: The School of Suffering
• Angelus Silesius: Paradox and Transformation